Tuesday, February 19, 2008

Many things irk me. As I’ve gotten older, I irk more easily. I probably over-irk. Things that wouldn’t have bothered me 10 years ago tend to frost my ass now. The weather lately, for example. The weather really has me in an almost constant state of irkdom. Never used to bother me all that much. I mean, come on, I live in the Midwest, and winters are generally harsh, and you suck it up and move on. Now? I’m staring at weather.com constantly and declaring them insane (as I have decided I fancy myself a meteorologist simply because I like watching shows about tornadoes). And then I’m staring out the window as yet another snow squall blows through. I find myself grumbling about the damn kids today. Back in The Day, I wrote a jolly little comedy song called "I Hope I Die Before I Hit 30". Now I'm staring down the barrel at 40. There are days it's all I can do not to curl up in a curmudgeonly ball and just...hiss angrily at the world.

But someone that makes me gleeful is Seth Rogen. My, he makes me chortle merrily. He's funny and adorable as all get out, and how delightful it is that the current movie he's working on, "Zack and Miri Make a Porno", is written and directed by someone else that makes me super-gleeful--Kevin Smith. When I like somebody and their work, whether it be Seth or Kevin or Trent Reznor or whomever, I have a tendency to get...irky when someone goes after what I like in a negative fashion. I will go from zero to ENRAGED in 2.3 seconds, whether it's a screed or a mere offhand comment online or IRL. I don't know these fellows personally or any of the other number of artists, actors, or musicians that I am enthusiastic about, but if you take a shot at something or someone I enjoy and have nothing to back your opinion except "ZOMG SUCK BECAUSE OF THE SUCK SUCKY SUCK AND UR DUM IF U LEIK IT", I'm afraid I'm going to get testy. I am growed up enough to accept people not liking the things I like, and I can easily get behind the statement "it's just not my taste/thing".

So you can imagine my...irkdom as I was flipping through the Hollywood issue of Vanity Fair over the weekend. It's one of my favorite issues, as I mentioned in an earlier post. Over the years, they've done some great photo shoots. I've always dug the ones where they've reunited the cast from iconic films like "Star Wars" (before the prequels started raging) or "Fast Times at Ridgemont High" (there are moments where I still boggle that Sean Penn was Spicoli). This year's theme was re-enacting scenes from Hitchcock movies, featuring Jodie Foster in "The Birds", Jennifer Jason Leigh and Keira Knightley in "Rebecca", and so on. Well, you can imagine my fangirlish delight to find Seth Rogen re-enacting the classic plane chase scene from "North By Northwest", which starred Cary Grant. The picture looks great, he looks great, it's just a glossy page of motherfucking great. To go along with the portfolio is a behind-the-scenes article, talking to the photographers involved and whatnot. Of course, getting the "North by Northwest" homage together was a struggle. There was hoo-hah involving the plane and California laws about operating one close to, you know, PEOPLE, but apparently photographer Art Streiber felt that this was a terribly significant roadblock:

The next challenge was Rogen. "We probably did a dozen passes where Seth was actually running," Streiber says. "At each go he probably ran for about 20 yards at a full sprint, which is not something Seth Rogen does on a regular basis."

Ohhhhh, I get it! Because Seth's fat, IT WAS MOST TERRIBLY CHALLENGING TO GET HIM TO RUN. Never mind THE MOTHERFUCKING BI-PLANE THAT YOU'RE TRYING TO GET INTO THE SHOT. Getting the plane that's flying at, like, 200 miles per hour into a shot, now THAT'S EASY. But getting a fat guy to run? OH, THE HUMANITY. Did you have to bring someone in to tear Seth away from the snack table? After all, it's cold hard fact that when fat people aren't running around being fat at you, we're eating everything in sight. Watch your backs, skinnies. I'm just sayin'. If we run out of Hostess snack cakes, since all we ever eat is junk food, y'alls are next.

What in the high fuck does Seth's ability or inability to sprint 20 yards 90 times over have to do with anything? Seriously. How fucking hard would it be to say something like, oh, "It was very challenging to coordinate the airplane to match Seth's running speed" or "Seth was a real gamer and worked very hard to get this shot accomplished"? Heavens forfend! Seth's fat so therefore...IT IS IMPORTANT THAT A COMMENT BE MADE ON HIS BODY AND HIS ATHLETIC ABILITIES WITH SAID BODY SO THAT NO ONE FORGET THAT SETH ROGEN DOES NOT HAVE CHISELED ABS AND DOES NOT LOOK LIKE GEORGE CLOONEY*. You know what, I look at George Clooney and I say "hello, sailor"; and I look at Seth Rogen and I say "hello, sailor" as well because both of them are fetching. They look nothing alike, and that's OKAY. If you don't find George Clooney or Seth Rogen fetching, that's okay too. Part of the whole "We're All Special Snowflakes" deal is that not only do we not all look alike, we also don't find the same body types physically attractive. And that's okay.

Or, it's supposed to be okay. The more people are willing to be loud and proud about what they find fetching in others, even if it doesn't fit the societal demand for magazine-cover-perfection, the more okay it will get. It's important that it gets more okay because there's nothing foxy about self-loathing. And there's nothing foxy about engendering it in others.

*According to the BMI, George Clooney is obese. Welcome to Club Chubby, Clooney!

2 comments:

1) I just discovered your blog and LOVE IT! "Frost my ass" and "stars and garters" will now be part of my daily linguistic repetoire.

2) Seth Rogen is a-freakin-dorable, and I love the concept of him as Cary Grant

3)I've just become acquainted with the fatosphere, and it's really opening my eyes. When I read through the photographer's quote, I found it completely innocuous. I thought, "Why is this blogger freaking out so bad?". But as I read it a second and third time, and imagined someone saying that about a thin person, and realizing that they wouldn't, I came to realize how many little fat-negative comments go straight to my subconscious every day without protest from me. As a fat chick who has ALWAYS hated her body, I think those sort of things about myself all the time, so when others say them, they don't register as wrong. And I have one more bit of fodder for my mental self-insult rolodex. Yours and other brave blogs from the fatosphere have been teaching me to put up defenses against these subconscious cancers and realize that no one has the right to make me think I'm not worthwhile, either through outright abuse, or snarky little left-handed comments about running. Thanks